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How Classy Are You?

It used to be in class-conscious Britain that there were three social classes; working (or lower) class, middle class and upper class. People often refined that by describing themselves as lower middle class or whatever.

Recently the BBC has been running a story which says that the old three classes are outdated and it suggests seven new ones, namely:

Re: How Classy Are You?

I answered Precarious proletariat... cause it sounded cool then i took the test you posted and came up with Elite... I guess it aint so cool... Perhaps I was thinking of the Praetorian Guard for the Praetor...

Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve.~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Re: How Classy Are You?

I tried that survey on the BBC website a few days ago - it's already been widely rubbished by participants as a load of nonsense and providing inaccurate results.

Case in point - I tried it for myself and got Precariat, the lowest class (which I'm certainly NOT) and then I tried it for my dad and got Elite, the highest class (which he is definitely NOT) - we're both middle class.

My dad was a college lecturer in textiles and finally paid off the mortgage on the house a decade ago, he is now self-employed and runs a tourist shop. That doesn't sound to me like upper-class elite, but nor does it sound like lower-class poor.

Plus they fail to take geographical location into account. Everyone I've met down here in Sussex seems exceedingly upper-middle class and well-to-do from my perspective, yet someone with the same money/career/interests in the Scottish Highlands is always going to seem more rural, rustic, down-to-earth and lower-middle class.

Re: How Classy Are You?

Only a student right now but it looks like I'm headed towards technical middle class upon entry into the workforce (hopefully within the next few years). Culturally, I like to think of myself as elite.

Re: How Classy Are You?

I am predicting that as a society the West will drop all doublings necessary for distinctions of class , the UK probably being the worst - almost everything before maybe 1980 was doubled for class , this "doubling" being in my estimation one clear instance of discrimination - separate doubled bathrooms restaurants drinking fountains for blacks ( maybe exactly the same but repeated ) . Actually US cultural world dominance one thing we all must be greatful for is it's rather aggressive opposition to class , egalitarianism , if the English are still hobbled by that absurdity .

Re: How Classy Are You?

Originally Posted by csb999

I am predicting that as a society the West will drop all doublings necessary for distinctions of class , the UK probably being the worst - almost everything before maybe 1980 was doubled for class , this "doubling" being in my estimation one clear instance of discrimination - separate doubled bathrooms restaurants drinking fountains for blacks ( maybe exactly the same but repeated ) . Actually US cultural world dominance one thing we all must be greatful for is it's rather aggressive opposition to class , egalitarianism , if the English are still hobbled by that absurdity .

I'm at a loss to know what to make of this. In the UK there are no separate facilities for different ethnic groups or anything like it. Nor, as far as I'm aware, has there ever been. This is something the US once shared with apartheid South Africa and which is now thankfully confined to history.

There are, I suppose, informal separations on a class basis in the UK. For instance, there are pubs and bars in my own city which I wouldn't dream of entering. And I don't mean the straight ones! It's just that different social classes stick, by and large, to their own places.

Re: How Classy Are You?

I'm "elite" but yeah. I also assumed a "solicitor" in a lawyer and "stately homes" is a bad synonym for "second property". In the US, a solicitor is a door-to-door salesperson, thus the "no soliciting" signs.

Still, I would consider myself born, raised and currently upper-middle class.

Re: How Classy Are You?

did you have to make it a public poll? i don't want everybody to know i'm broke.

Well then, you shouldn't have SAID that you are.

I fall into such a nontraditional slot, that I'm having trouble figuring out which. I'll vote if I figure it out.

"Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking." -The Scarecrow, WIZARD OF OZ, 1939Betsy DeVos, Secretary of Education, to under-performing schools: DROP DEAD.Make, for a man, a fire - and he'll be warm for a few hours. Set a man afire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at people who are hurting, it's not satire, it's bullying. - Terry Pratchett

Re: How Classy Are You?

I came out as NEW AFFLUENT WORKERS, the sparsest category in this poll.

"Some people without brains do an awful lot of talking." -The Scarecrow, WIZARD OF OZ, 1939Betsy DeVos, Secretary of Education, to under-performing schools: DROP DEAD.Make, for a man, a fire - and he'll be warm for a few hours. Set a man afire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.Satire is meant to ridicule power. If you are laughing at people who are hurting, it's not satire, it's bullying. - Terry Pratchett